Recent years have witnessed the development and deployment of a wide range of electronic devices and systems that provide many new functions and services. Advancements in communication technologies for instance, have permitted the development and deployment of a wide array of communication devices, equipment, and communication infrastructures. Such development, deployment, and popular use have changed the lives and daily habits of many.
Cellular telephone and other wireless communication systems have been developed and deployed and have achieved significant levels of usage. Increasing technological capabilities along with decreasing equipment and operational costs have permitted, by way of such wireless communication systems, increased communication capabilities to be provided at lowered costs.
Early-generation, wireless communication systems generally provided for voice communications and limited data communications. Successor-generation communication systems have provided increasingly data-intensive communication capabilities and services. New-generation communication system, for instance, provide for the communication of large data files at high through-put rates via attachment to data messages.
Wireless communications are typically effectuated through use of portable wireless devices, which are sometimes referred to as mobile stations. The wireless devices are typically of small dimensions, thereby to increase the likelihood that the device shall be hand-carried and available for use whenever needed as long as the wireless devices positioned within an area encompassed by a network of the cellular, or analogous, communication system. A wireless device includes transceiver circuitry to provide for radio communication, both to receive information and to send information.
Some wireless devices are now provided with additional functionality. Some of the additional functionality provided to a wireless device is communication-related while other functionality is related to other technologies. When so-configured, the wireless device forms a multi-functional device, having multiple functionalities.
A camera functionality that provides for the capture and recordation of a photographic image or a series of images is amongst the functionalities that are now sometimes provided to wireless devices. Because of the small dimensions of typical wireless devices, and the regular carriage of such devices by users, a wireless device having camera functionality is available to the user to record an image or series of images.
An image, once recorded can be saved, for example, at a storage element of the wireless device and/or can be transferred elsewhere because the recorded image is defined or kept as a file, which is generally considered to be a named or identified collection of information, such as a set of data bits or bytes used by a program. And, since the recorded image is kept as a file, the file can be appended to a data message and sent elsewhere. The data file forming the image or images is also storable at the wireless device, available subsequently to be viewed at the wireless device.
Camera functionality provided to a wireless device typically includes a camera lens that functions to focus a subject. Camera-capable wireless devices also include structures to form and permit saving of a captured image. In more sophisticated implementations, the camera lens is movable to provide for a change in the focal point of a camera image.